Shape Bham strives to think more comprehensively about planning, by adopting a health lens and promoting policies that foster a healthy social and physical environment.

Assessing Health In Your Community

Shape Bham is an initiative that brings academic trained researchers and city planners, alike, to translate research into practice, and to integrate health and equity into the Birmingham City planning process at the neighborhood level. Shape Bham is supported by a nationally and highly regarded policy organization, PEW Charitable Trusts, based in D.C., and the Regional Planning Commission of Greater Birmingham, in collaboration with the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Schools of Public Health and Sociology, and the Edge Chaos.

Shape Bham coalesces city planning and public health policies into a uniform health assessment tool or “report card” so that policy makers and neighborhood residents can measure the quality of life in Birmingham neighborhoods and proactively target equitable access to health promoting resources across all neighborhoods. To learn more click above.

Shape Bham uses the Healthy Communities Assessment Tool (HCAT), which was developed by the U.S. Department and Urban Development, to assess the quality of life in neighborhoods based on a vast array of social and environmental conditions that impact community health. To learn more click above.

Health is a central factor in the quality of life of Americans, and is increasingly recognized as a human rights issue. Yet, the intersection of health and planning policies, especially local planning policy initiatives, is not always obvious. ​The City of Birmingham Comprehensive Plan and Framework Plans sit at the intersection of planning and health. The Shape Bham project strives to bridge the gap between planning and public health policies. To learn more click above.